Are your agents spending hours dialing phone numbers, only to be met with busy tones and endless voicemails?
If the answer is “YES,” then you are not alone. Thousands of organizations across the world are facing the same issue.
Yes, we understand that this is a BIG problem.
Because your agents’ time is supremely valuable – and they need to make every second count.
An auto-dialer is just the tool you need, It helps maximize productivity and efficiency of the sales call and streamlining the process. It also helps increase agent’s talk time by 200-300% (a massive boost to their productivity!).
But the big question is – How exactly does an auto-dialer improve the efficiency and productivity of the sales calls?
Before we answer this question, let us understand the basics of auto-dialers.
What is an Auto-dialer?
An auto-dialer (also known as an automatic phone dialer) is a telephony software that automates your outbound sales calls. It does this by dialing a list of phone numbers and connecting your agent only when the receiver answers the call.
This way, it ensures that your agents don’t have to waste time listening to busy tunes/ ringtones rather than closing other deals. This is probably one of the easiest ways to improve the efficiency of your sales team in a short period.
The auto-dialer is quite simple to use. It dials the numbers present in a contact list one by one. If someone answers, the call connects. If not, it skips that person and moves on to the next number on the list. The auto-dialers can also determine if it is a voicemail or an actual person on the other side of the line and take appropriate action.
But that’s not even the best part about it!
Did you know that it can collect data about the number of people who picked up the call, how long the conversations lasted, and how many failed to answer? It will display all this information on the personalized dashboard of every user to improve their call campaigns.
There are mainly three types of auto-dialers:
● Progressive dialer – makes one call after another with a predefined time gap.
● Predictive dialer – through an intelligent algorithm determines when the next agent is ready for a call and places that contact at the top of the queue.
● IVR dialer – plays a prerecorded message to the call recipient and leaves an audio recording in case the recipient does not answer the call.
● Power dialer – dials a phone number immediately after a call is completed. In other words, once the agent completes the call, the power dialer will call the next contact on the list.
Benefits of using an Auto-dialer in 2023
Boston Consulting Group estimates most companies waste roughly 30% to 50% of their sales budgets on inefficient processes, leading to productivity shortfalls, lost opportunities, inefficient sales prospecting, and revenue leakage. If you do not want to be one of those companies, you must start using tools like an auto-dialer to improve the efficiency of your sales calls. Besides that, an auto-dialer offers a host of other benefits, such as:
1. Increased Number of Sales Calls
Since an auto-dialer connects a sales rep only when the recipient answers, it increases the number of calls they make daily.
For example, without an auto-dialer, an agent may be able to dial only 10-20 numbers in an hour. Most of their time will be spent dialing numbers, waiting for answers, and listening to voicemails.
However, with an auto-dialer, the same agent could reach hundreds of people in an hour as it eliminates all the downtime between calls. This increases the volume of sales calls made in a day and increases the agent’s chance of closing deals and reaching their sales targets.
2. Personalized Sales Interactions
An automatic dialer or auto-dialer can also be integrated with your Customer Relationship Management software like LeadSquared. This will enable your sales reps to access key information like names and previous interactions with the prospect just before the call.
When your reps have this information handy, it can help them personalize their approach and increase the chances of conversion. Also, when your auto-dialer is integrated with CRM, it can eliminate the need to manually enter call data, reducing the risk of human errors.
3. Reduced Idle Time
No sales agent wants to spend time dialing numbers or listening to busy tones. They would rather spend that time achieving their sales targets. When you adopt an auto-dialer, you create an automated ecosystem in which the agents have limited idle time.
They will be utilizing all their time to sell and achieve their monthly goals. This will drastically reduce their frustration, which, in turn, will result in improved productivity and better efficiency among the employees.
4. Monitoring and Reporting
Some auto-dialers also come with in-built reports and an analytics engine that generates key insights about your calls, such as call outcomes, duration, volume, etc. These tools can also help you analyze your cold-calling data and identify trends and patterns.
For instance, you can find out which times of the day are most effective for making cold calls, which scripts are the most successful, which demographics have higher chances of conversion, and so on.
Such information can be used to make key informed decisions related to resource allocation, thereby improving the overall efficiency of your team.
5. Access to Advanced Features
Besides analytics and integration with CRM, some automated dialer software also come equipped with a host of advanced features that improve the overall efficiency of your sales call.
The sales call recording feature is a classic example. As the name suggests, this feature automatically records all your sales calls so you can access them later, like when you are training new employees in your organization.
Another key feature is the Chrome extension. This feature ensures you can use auto-dialer from any device while running Google Chrome. Just knowing all the benefits of an auto-dialer is important but choosing an efficient and productive auto-dialer is altogether a different ball game. Lets have a look at few of the factors you should consider while choosing an auto-dialer.
How to Choose an Auto-dialer to Boost Your Organization’s Efficiency and Productivity?
Choosing an auto-dialer from hundreds of options available with varying capabilities and features is a daunting task. In this section, we will look at five factors you must consider while finalizing your auto-dialer:
1. Cost
Most auto-dialers come in a monthly subscription model. The price can vary between a few dollars and hundreds per month. You can automatically eliminate those tools that do not fit your budget. And for the rest, you must thoroughly analyze the cost against the potential benefits and higher ROI you can draw from it.
2. Integrations
If you’ve been in business for long, there is a high chance that you are already using a CRM or a lead management tool. If not, the auto-dialer you choose must offer integration capabilities with these tools.
The best part about integrating your auto-dialer with CRM is that you don’t have to manually feed in any data and have a single source of data for all your calls, eliminating the chances of misinformation or human errors.
LeadSquared offers plug & play integration with FreJun. To know more, click here.
3. User-friendly
The auto-dialer you choose must have a flat learning curve and be user-friendly. Even someone who has recently joined your organization must be able to use the tool with minimal training.
Pro Tip: To understand how user-friendly the tool is, review the platform’s reviews in different portals like G2 and Capterra. Analyze what the customers have said about the platform’s user-friendliness and make a decision based on that.
4. Customization
In business, the ‘one size fits all concept’ seldom works. Any auto-dialer you pick must be tailored to your industry, company size, and needs. For instance, some tools offer advanced features suitable only for large organizations.
If you are SMB, those features might be overkill and confuse your team. You will also end up paying for many features you will never use. So, always pick an auto-dialer that is customized to your needs or can be customized quickly. Now that you know the benefits of an auto-dialer and which aspects to look for while choosing an optimum auto-dialer, learning a few tips on how to maximize the sales efficiency would be the cherry on the cake.
Tips for Driving Maximum Sales Efficiency and Productivity Using an Auto-dialer
You now know what an auto-dialer is, what its benefits are, and how to pick one for your business. All that is left is to use it to drive growth for your business. However, like every other platform or technology, there are some best practices you must follow to reap the benefits of the tool auto-dialer fully.
In this section, we will take a look at some of these battle-tested strategies to maximize the output of your auto-dialer:
1. Set Clear Goals
Before using an auto-dialer, it is important to have clears goals in mind. You must answer the key question – what do I want to achieve with this auto-dialer? Your goals could be anything from improving the daily call volume to increasing the conversion rate. Setting a proper goal will also help measure the tool’s success and ROI.
2. Provide Training and Coaching
To get the most out of your auto-dialer, you must provide your sales team with the required training and coaching. The training plan must not only revolve around how to use the tool effectively but also on the messaging and tone they must adopt for every call and, more importantly, how to handle objections. This will make them more effective at selling.
3. Always Have a Clean CRM
This is applicable only if your auto-dialer can be integrated with CRM. You must ensure that the customer data in the CRM is always accurate and updated. Only then will your auto-dialer be effective. For instance, if your contact information for most of the prospects is wrong, your auto-dialer will never be able to connect with the right prospect, thereby wasting your agent’s time.
4. Monitor Continuously
You must regularly monitor your auto-dialer to ensure it performs well. Unless you track the tool’s effectiveness, you will never know if it is a good investment. Keep asking for feedback from your sales agents and try to understand if they are facing any issues while using the tool. If there are any problems, get them resolved instantly with the service provider.
Conclusion
As you have seen in this post, an auto-dialer is a modern piece of technology that can significantly boost the efficiency and productivity of your sales teams. By enabling your team to make outbound automated calls, an auto-dialer lets your sales team reach more prospects quickly, saving valuable time and resources. Also, don’t forget to follow the tips highlighted in this post to maximize its effectiveness. Whether you are a small business or a large corporation, there is an auto-dialer for you to improve your sales process.
FAQs
Yes, many auto-dialers offer integrations with popular sales and marketing tools, email marketing platforms, and lead management systems such as LeadSquared to improve the productivity of your sales team.
Yes, many auto-dialers come with analytics and reporting feature that offers valuable performance metrics such as call volume, call outcomes, call duration, etc. By tracking these metrics, you can alter your sales calling strategy as and when needed.
The number of calls an auto-dialer can make in a day depends on the platform you are using and the plan you have chosen. However, most tools are capable of making a high volume of calls per day.
